If you're new here, you may want to subscribe to my RSS feed. If you have any questions, please see my policies page or if you would like to contact me, you can do so here. You can find out more about me here. I sincerely thank you for visiting!

I am a happy subscriber of XM Radio. It’s saved me on many a trip to my in-laws when I couldn’t find a decent radio station. The fact I can listen to the (no longer World Champions) White Sox even though I no longer live in Chicago makes me happier than you can imagine.

But I think satellite radio as the death of terrestrial radio (you know, the old fashioned free kind) is overrated. Satellite radio may not even make it as XM and it’s only competitor Sirius still hemorrhage cash without end in sight. I still listen to normal radio in the car when I don’t feel like switching out the XM receiver and my iPod (and I forget my iPod).

That brings me to what I think will be about the death of radio for me. My iPod and podcasts. Now that This American Life and Marketplace have both gone to free podcasts, I’m only waiting for Car Talk to go free before I stop listening to NPR via radio entirely (yes, I will still support my local station).

I’ve found free podcasts that cover just about anything. I might pay for the daily WSJ podcast or a couple of others, but most of the podcasts I have are free. Several BusinessWeek podcasts, Engadget, and the Tax Foundation make up some of them. Others are more specific to music genres.

But the more I delve into podcasts, the less time I have for radio. If I can get all of the radio I want the way I want it, why listen to commercial radio and deal with ads? If I can get it free, why should I subscribe to XM, for that matter? Radio will have to adapt to survive, something it hasn’t done in the face of satellite radio.

HD radio is one way they could do it. It allows for multiple channels per frequency and could allow a station to broadcast multiple streams of music to further segment their audience. Ads could be better targeted (though ads for my age group don’t necessarily interest me) which would command a premium even though the audience may be smaller.

But that would require the industry to change, which it largely hasn’t done in the past 50 years (we still have payola, for cryin’ out loud!). We have the largest radio provider going private, which will likely kill any investment they are making in HD radio (Private Equity firms aren’t known for spending money on anything but themselves). We have risk-averse programmers playing only songs from major labels (see payola) where they have a guaranteed return. We have stations mostly owned by large corporate entities that are interested only in profits and not art.

And that’s why I am turning more to podcasts and away from traditional radio. And I know I’m not the only one.